It is Thursday night, and the room is full of Ohio State students. The room is filled with smoke. Music playing subtly in the background is interspersed with conversation.
This might sound like a typical OSU house party, but in reality, it is something quite different.
“The whole idea was an alternative to going out to drink,” said Feras Abou-Galala, a graduate student in electrical engineering and part owner of the Shi-Sha Lounge.
Students can experience the tradition of Nargilah while they relax on big, comfortable furniture.
Nargilah, which is the practice of smoking flavored tobacco through brilliantly-colorful hookahs, originated in India and eventually migrated to the Middle East.
For anybody who has seen “Alice In Wonderland,” think about the caterpillar and one will have an idea of what a hookah looks like.
Made of glass, a hookah has a large sphere-like base that leads up to a slender tube-shaped neck. Users place flavored tobacco into a bowl that sits atop the hookah and is heated with a hot coal.
“(It’s a) nice cultural experience, different than going to the movies or shopping,” said Tina Fong, a sophomore in accounting.
Fong said she went to Shi-Sha a lot when she was younger.
The history of the Shi-Sha Lounge is short, considering it opened in December 2003. But that does not make the history any less interesting.
The owners met in the all-night café Buckeye Donuts and created the idea of Shi-Sha, Abou-Galala said.
“We bonded over the hookah,” Abou-Galala said, who said that he kept a small hookah in the trunk of his car.
While bonding over the hookah, the owners began discussing the idea of opening up their own place where they could promote Nargilah and cater to students who preferred to stay up late.
Buying a space on North High Street that used to be a hair salon, the men turned it into the nearest hookah bar to campus.
“When we opened this place, we had no idea what was going to happen,” Abou-Galala said.
The owners created a completely different atmosphere than most OSU students experience.
That atmosphere is not the same as a local campus bar because alcohol is not sold. Instead, it is a more relaxed and calm atmosphere. Abou-Galala could not recall a time when he had to forcibly remove someone for being too rowdy.
Relaxing while enjoying a smoke, however, is not the only thing the Shi-Sha Lounge has to offer.
Art shows are held once a month, movie nights are held every week and every Wednesday the unofficial house band plays. When bands do play at Shi-Sha, they are asked to replace their drum kits with an alternative percussion instrument, preferably an African drum, Abou-Galala said.
Adding to its unusual atmosphere, patrons will find OSU students engaging in something unlikely to be found at the nearest bar – homework.
Scott McKinley, a graduate student in the math department, was there Thursday night, but he was not there to smoke.
“I can feel comfortable to do homework late at night (at Shi-Sha),” McKinley said.
Daniel Milosevic, an OSU alumnus, said he spent two years there, studying all day and smoking all night. He added that most people are not there during the day, a time when he would get two to three hours of studying done. Abou-Galala said OSU professors come to Shi-Sha to prepare for their next class.
The diversity of Shi-Sha’s customers adds to its uniqueness.
“For the first month, we had only international students,” Abou-Galala said. Now, students of all different backgrounds can be found there.
On one Thursday night alone, Indian, Palestinian, white, black and Jewish students can be found enjoying the atmosphere of Shi-Sha.
The customers’ diversity is reflected in the owners’ own diversity.
“If you’ve got different backgrounds, it helps with starting a business,” Abou-Galala said of the group of owners which are made up of Middle Eastern, Somolian and white OSU students.
The business is operated by students, and eventually they might have to leave in pursuit of their own careers.
Asked what was next for the Shi-Sha Lounge, Abou-Galala shrugged. Not wanting to give definite plans, he said that if he or any of the other owners had to leave, they have a staff that can take over with no problems.
Looking back at the last two years, Abou-Galala takes pride in what he and his partners have accomplished and what they have given to OSU students.
“It’s necessary to have a place like Shi-Sha, it gives you a place to stay out late,” he said.
